


in his eyes a flaming glow

by sqacedust



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: 11 had wii sports, 13 has just dance, Disclaimer: I haven’t played just dance in ages, F/F, Fluff, Just Dance, Spoilers for Revolution of the Daleks, The Doctor is oblivious, Yaz has a crush, as usual, because of course she does, post Revolution of the Daleks, pre-thasmin, the doctor knows Rasputin by memory, yaz is an abba fan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-12 19:01:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29015514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sqacedust/pseuds/sqacedust
Summary: SPOILERS FOR REVOLUTION OF THE DALEKS!-The Doctor finds a Wii and manages to rope Yaz into her antics, resulting a very competitive few rounds of Just Dance.-Inspired by a conversation in the snag group chat of DW editors.
Relationships: Thirteenth Doctor/Yasmin Khan
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	in his eyes a flaming glow

**Author's Note:**

> Here I am, two weeks late, with the 13th Doctor Just Dance fic I promised a group of pals. I haven’t written anything since July and I’d really missed it, so this was nice!
> 
> MAJOR REVOLUTION OF THE DALEKS SPOILERS

The day after Graham and Ryan stepped off the TARDIS for what was assumed to be the last time was the first day in over ten months that Yasmin Khan didn’t know what to do. For the last ten months, her days had been the same: wake up, eat, check the newspaper for job listings, look for leads on the Doctor, have dinner, shower. She slept when she remembered but her head was usually full of _her_ to sleep _._ Her Doctor. The Doctor who tried to help even those who wronged her. The Doctor who smiled even when things weren’t alright because she didn’t want her friends to worry. The Doctor who had given her the stars. The Doctor who lost Rose and left Jack. The Doctor who always, _always_ had an escape plan, because she must’ve escaped and Yaz had refused to believe otherwise and how _right_ she had been because the Doctor was back and… somewhere on the TARDIS. 

“Doctor?” Yaz called out, standing up from the steps in the TARDIS console room. 

Silence. 

She briefly considered braving the maze of hallways in the hopes that she’d stumble upon her friend somewhere along the way, but a loud crash followed by a nearby, “Just a moment!” saved her the trouble. 

The Time Lord scrambled through the doorway, coat knotted around her waist and a Wii remote bound to her wrist. 

“Where were you?” Yaz eyed the Doctor’s disheveled hair, not sure if she wanted to hear the answer, knowing her friend. 

“I was cleaning out Jack’s room-“

“I thought you said he didn’t have a room?”

A guilty look came over the Doctor’s face. “He does. Sort of. I started using it as storage a few centuries ago. Figured I’d better get it sorted if he’s gonna be popping in again. But you’ll never believe what I just found!”

The Doctor’s eyes lit up in the way that made Yaz certain she had constellations in them. 

“A Wii?” Yaz smirked. 

“A W-“ Her face fell and Yaz immediately regretted her response. “How’d you guess?”

Yaz gestured to the remote hanging from the Doctor’s wrist. 

“Ah. Makes sense. Wanna join me?”

Well, it's not like Yaz could say no to her. 

The Doctor wasn't kidding when she said the room needed tidying, although Yaz suspected there’d been less cleaning going on and more fiddling around with random objects. The couch was covered with random knick knacks (most of which did not look like they were from Earth) and small statues. Large rocks (of course the Doctor collects rocks), artifacts, and… various other things Yaz couldn’t identify littered the floor. The Wii sat on a wooden box that rattled every few seconds. 

“Right,” the Doctor rifled through a box of CDs. “What do you wanna play? We’ve got Mario Kart… Legend of Zelda… JUST DANCE! I haven’t played this in ages! Not to brag, but I’m quite good at it,” she said smugly. 

Yaz laughed. “You’re the least graceful person I know. No way are you good at Just Dance.”

“Is that a challenge, Yaz?”

Despite the warmth growing in her cheeks, Yaz stood up straighter. “That depends. Are you sure you’re up for the challenge?”

“Definitely. Winner gets to pick where-  _ or when _ \- we go next.” The Doctor grabbed her coat from around her waist, throwing it into the corner of the room. 

“Right then,” Yaz picked up a controller, snatching the CD from the Doctor and inserting it into the console. “You pick the first song. Person with the highest score wins.”

“You’ve just sealed your fate, Yasmin Khan. I choose,” she dramatically pointed the Wii remote to the screen, opening Just Dance and making herself Player 1, “Daddy Cool.”

Yaz scoffed. “Of course you’re starting with a track called “Daddy Cool.””

“Don’t knock it!”

“I can tell this’ll be interesting just from the thumbnail. Is that a  _ panda _ ?”

“Interesting? Yes. Weird? Yes. Fun? Definitely.”

“You just described yourself.”

“Thanks! Now… let's get this started so I can beat you already.” The Doctor clicked the song and the scene formulated around the character- indeed a giant panda-on a raft floating down a river. Branches full of toucans emerged from the sides of the screen and pineapples rotated behind him, fueling Yaz’s belief that this was, indeed, the weirdest song the Doctor could have chosen. 

As if things couldn’t get any weirder, the toucans began singing, but Yaz hardly took any notice as the dance had begun, both her and the Doctor following the movements of the character on screen. During a calmer, more repetitive part of the choreography, Yaz risked a glance at her icon long enough for her to notice the stream of ‘Super’s and occasional ‘Perfect’s that flashed beneath it. 

“Looks like this’ll be easier than I thought,” Yaz taunted. 

“You sure? Last I checked, I was a whole star ahead of you.”

Yaz cursed under her breath. Not only was she right, but in the two seconds it took for her to register it another star appeared under the Doctor’s icon, and there was no way she'd let herself get beaten by the woman (?) whose preferred dance move was called ‘the drunk giraffe.’ 

The Doctor danced with so much energy. She just needed to match it. She made her movements sharper, less sluggish, especially with the arm clutching the remote. Even then, she danced with her whole body, following every movement rather than just her upper body with minimal footwork. This had to work, right? 

Those damned slow parts. She’d been getting more and more ‘Perfect’s until the slower parts. How could one go from getting such good scores to so many ‘X’s? Yaz didn’t even want to look at how the Doctor was doing, already knowing the answer. 

“HA!” the Doctor cheered, panting slightly. “This too hard for you, Yaz?”

Yaz bit the inside of her mouth in embarrassment, but her eyes flared at the Doctor as if to say, “Is that all you’ve got?” 

“Never.”

“If you say so.”

It turned out that while Yaz had what it took to get a decent score, she couldn’t beat the Doctor. 

“You get to choose next,” said the victor, a Grinch-like smile spreading across her face. “No pressure, but if you lose this one, I win by default.”

“You got lucky this time,” Yaz grumbled, snatching the Doctor’s Player 1 controller from her. 

“No need to be a  _ sore loser _ .” 

Electing to ignore the comment, Yaz painstakingly clicked letter after letter in the search bar, searching for the song she’d known she’d pick from the moment she challenged the Doctor. The chorus of “Honey, Honey” flowed from the speakers as Yaz hovered over the song’s all too familiar icon. She silently thanked her sister for making her play this with her so many times during her ‘Mamma Mia’ phase (which Yaz might’ve gotten her into). 

“Never can go wrong with ABBA! Shame they don’t have “Name of the Game” on here. That one’s my favorite.”

“Really? I would’ve expected “Waterloo” or something more party-ish from you, not a song about worrying if someone loves you or not.”

“Yeah, well…”

With that, the Doctor’s jaw clenched and Yaz could’ve sworn her cheeks were a bit pinker than usual, but before she could say anything, the Doctor had taken the remote back and clicked the start button, forcing Yaz to revert back to focus mode. 

The curtains drew back, revealing a stage, a bedroom occupied by three girls having a sleepover on one side and a diner with a male figure on the other. 

Yaz’s character, the girl to the far right of the bedroom (Sonya was always the main female and insisted it would be weird for Yaz to play the love interest) giggled and teased her friend while the male- the Doctor’s character- greased his hair back before beginning to dance. 

Muscle memory kicked in, and Yaz was getting considerably more ‘Perfect’s than last round. The only challenging part came when she had to lean on one of the other sleepover girls (given that she didn’t actually have someone to lean on), but she managed it. The Doctor, it seemed, was struggling too; Yaz didn’t bother glancing at the Doctor, not wanting to break concentration, but she was making grunting sounds that Yaz assumed were from her trying too hard when the choreography called for her to flex her muscles. 

“Having a hard time there, Doctor?” 

“You wish.”

It was a comfort to Yaz to know that the Doctor was having a harder time with this one, especially considering the Time Lord had chosen the easiest character in the song.

Yaz finished nearly two stars ahead of the Doctor, who grumbled some excuse about her suspenders slipping and distracting her. 

“Who’s a sore loser now?” Yaz teased. 

The look the Doctor gave her would’ve been intimidating had Yaz not found her so adorable in that moment. 

“A lapse in my skill, but I’ve only got to win one more game.” She smirked as though she’d outsmarted, Yaz. 

“So’ve I.”

The Doctor paused, grumbling. “Fine. We’ll choose the next song randomly. I get the remote ‘cause it’d be my turn to pick.”

She picked up her Player 1 controller and clicked to the song list before turning away from the TV, randomly clicking the arrow keys on her controller with lightning fast fingers. 

“Aaaaand…. select!” The Doctor turned around to see which song the lucky duo would play, but the music reached her first. 

““Rasputin”?!” They simultaneously exclaimed. 

“No way! Too hard.” Yaz crossed her arms.

“Yes way! I’m ace at this song.”

“You’re good at “Rasputin”? That dance requires so much stamina.”

“Yeah well you know what else requires a lot of stamina?” The Doctor took a step near Yaz, whose heart began beating much more rapidly. 

Throat dry, Yaz dared to reply: “What?”

The Doctor put her arms up and stepped away just enough for the both of them to have enough space to dance. “Running!” her friend said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. 

“Running?,” was all Yaz could say. 

“We do it all the time with how much trouble we get into. Weren’t you a copper, Yaz? Your stamina must be great!”

Yaz wiped away the light layer of sweat that had formed on her forehead over the course of the last two dances. She hoped the Doctor would attribute how red her face was to that too. 

“I- uh- quit months ago.”  _ To look for you.  _

“You know, I know Rasputin. Well, I don’t  _ know him _ know him, but I met him once. Weird guy. Probably never gonna do that again. Right! Ready to begin?”

Before Yaz could utter a single syllable, the Doctor clicked play and the scene began to form around them. 

A figure in a mint green uniform faded into the snowy landscape, standing on what appeared to be a frozen lake. The figure fell into the dance almost immediately, clapping to the rhythm while flexing its leg to the beat. More instruments joined in, and the figure flexed its arms, diving forward and back. 

‘This isn’t so bad,’ Yaz caught herself thinking, stopping herself from underestimating the song. She knew better when it came to this dance, notorious for its difficulty. 

Right on cue, the figure dropped into a half-squatted position, kicking alternating legs out to the side while doing coordinating arm movements. Yaz only got through a few before the muscles in her thighs began to ache. The chorus of “HEY!”s shouted by the offscreen singers did nothing to encourage her. 

And then, of course, it kept getting worse! 

Instead of simply squating, the dancer popped up into a starfish sort of position, before falling back into the squat and then up again. 

Yaz’s breathing was getting more unstable now, and she was significantly sloppier with this dance compared to the two that preceded it; her heel connected with the ground in an awkward position, and had she not stumbled and caught herself, she might have rolled her ankle, but all her mind focused on was doing the moves in time and upping her score. It wasn't looking good, though. The words below her name were ‘Good’ at best and ‘Ok’ on average, and she’d only just gotten her first star. She found a moment to catch her breath (and improve her score) when the choreography called for her to mime playing some sort of string instrument (a violin? a fiddle? Yaz wasn’t well versed enough with the song to know). Fortunately, she managed to get a ‘Super’. 

_ “There lived a certain man in Russia long ago-“ _

The first verse was easier on her legs than the intro, with most of the moves being centered around her arms. The moves that did require lower body movements were usually just some sort of kick or step routine that were nowhere near as exerting as the squats. Yaz focused on her upper body this time, swinging her arms in punching and swaying movements with energy. Even so, her muscles hadn’t yet recovered from the exertion of the intro or the previous two dances, and each move made her ache more and more. The fatigue from three dances back-to-back was finally getting to her, when she needed it most, but she was ready to push through it.

Well, she thought she was. 

_ “Ra- Ra- Rasputin, lover of the Russian Queen-“ _

No squats this time, but the figure kicked so quickly from leg to leg that it was practically jumping, and its arms flung from side to side around its head. Her shoulders joined her leg muscles in telling her she was pushing them, but Yaz told herself she wasn’t anywhere near overexertion yet. This was just a… very competitive workout. Still, the urge to knock the knick knacks off of the couch and sink into the cushions sat at the edge of her mind. 

She couldn’t decide if it was lucky or not that the chorus was made entirely of the same dance move; the move was taxing, but not more so than most of those previously in the song. Before her train of thought could travel too far, another string instrument pantomime snapped her back to what really mattered: beating the Doctor. 

“Ready to give up yet?” the Doctor teased. 

Speak of the devil. 

Like Yaz, she was panting slightly. The companion noticed this and immediately tried to silence her own shallow breaths in an attempt to make it seem like she was executing the dance moves effortlessly. 

“You wish.”

Another back-and-forward sequence was replaced by the second verse, which, despite simply being a repetition of the first one in terms of choreography, was slightly more difficult due to the lack of stamina and the pain in the muscles that only ached worse and worse with each flex. 

Yaz dreaded the impending reprise of the chorus, which she knew would drain much of her remaining stamina. It was funny, really, that she’d faced giant spiders, wayward time travelers, Cybermen, Daleks, and cryptic figures from the Doctor’s past (she’d have to talk to her about that later) but was worried about the chorus of a 1970s pop song. 

She scraped by, although the ache in her shoulders now extended through her arms, making them tremble slightly. Her whole body felt tense, if not due to the workout then due to the spirit of competition, which flowed through Yaz’s veins with the force of a raging river. 

If one good thing came out of Graham and Ryan leaving (other than Yaz getting more time alone with the Doctor), it was that Yaz didn’t have to live with knowing they’d witnessed  _ this.  _

Nevertheless, she kept her head up. If she couldn’t win this dance battle then she’d at least keep her dignity. 

As the singing chorus dragged out the final note of the reprise, the figure began to slow its movement. Thankful for the lull in the song, Yaz took the opportunity to compare her score with the Doctor’s, still keeping up with the movements of the dancer. She wasn’t too far behind! She still had a chance to beat her if she just pushed through. 

_ “But when his drinkin’ and-“ _

The figure slowly crouched down into a squat. 

_ Oh no. _

_ “-lusting and his-“  _

Yaz got down, kicking her legs and flexing her arms to the side to the rapid beat of the music. 

_ “-hunger for power became known to more and more people-“ _

_ ‘Just a bit more! You’ve got this, Yaz,’ _ she told herself. 

_ “-the demands to do something about-“ _

She tried to think only of her desire to beat the Doctor, tried to push all other thoughts from her mind and ignore the ache in her limbs. There was no hiding her breathlessness now; her lungs burned, screaming for air, so her breaths were shallow and audible. It seemed to her like the figure was speeding up with each beat, and Yaz was struggling to keep up, leading her to get off beat and fall behind. All she could do now was hope she hadn’t lost too many points. 

_ “-this outrageous man became louder and louder-“ _

The dancer on screen snapped back up into a standing position, and although she saw the Doctor do the same from the corner of her eye, Yaz’s own body refused to cooperate. Her knees nearly buckled as she tried to stand; instead, she sat- not squatted- on the ground in defeat, dignity be damned. She pushed herself against the front of the couch and instead watched her friend keep going. 

The chorus of “Hey!”s returned, only this time, Yaz knew they weren’t cheering for her. The Wii remote buzzed in her hand, so she unclasped the strap and threw it into the pile on the couch. 

“You alright there, Yaz?” the Doctor asked. Out of concern, she’d turned her head to look at her companion, but was still effortlessly executing each move. Of course she had the whole thing memorized. 

“Yeah,” Yaz panted, “just out of breath.”

The Doctor stared at her for a moment, eyebrows furrowed. The figure in the snow was finishing a repeat of the choreography from the song’s intro, but the Time Lord didn’t return her gaze to the screen until the beginning of the final verse. 

The song faded out, leaving the Doctor on one knee doing overly enthusiastic jazz hands. She’d gotten all five stars, a grand accomplishment considering the difficulty of the dance. Yaz, on the other hand, had fallen short of three despite her efforts. 

“You’re pretty good for a human!” The Doctor took her place on the ground next to Yaz, fishing two custard creams from her pocket. She offered one to Yaz, who (politely) refused it. The Doctor then shoved both into her mouth, munching hungrily. 

“What’s that supposed to mean? Have you got some weird alien biology thing that makes you better at Just Dance?” Yaz inquired, half curious, half taken aback. 

The Doctor sheepishly looked away from her, chewing much slower now. 

“Cheater!” Yaz accused. 

“Technically, I didn’t cheat!” she exclaimed, mouth still full. Turning back towards her, she swallowed so quickly Yaz thought she was going to choke. “You’re the one who challenged me!”

Yaz scoffed, playfully smiling at her friend, who grumbled. 

“Fine then, you pick where we get to go next.”

She shook her head. “Nah, it’s alright. I don’t even know where I would’ve chosen to go.”

Nodding, the Doctor smiled at Yaz, then turned her attention to the Wii remote tied to her wrist. 

An uncomfortable silence fell between them, filled only by Yaz’s still ragged breaths. 

Then, before she could stop herself, “It’s a shame Graham and Ryan weren’t here. They could’ve done “Honey, Honey” with us.”

The Doctor bit the inside of her mouth, her smile faltering, and Yaz cursed herself. Her friend felt  _ guilty  _ and she’d brought them up. Why had she brought them up? Still, she felt compelled to comfort her friend, although not directly about that guilt just yet. 

“You know, just because they’re not traveling with us anymore, doesn’t mean we’ll never see them again,” Yaz tried. 

“Yeah…” 

There was something unconvincing in her tone. Not only that, but she refused to make eye contact, keeping her gaze downcast and focused on undoing and redoing the clasp on the Wii remote. It made Yaz think back to her conversation with Jack, but she pushed those thoughts away. It wasn’t like she’d let her just abandon them. 

“We could pop in one day. Do lunch.”

This time, the Doctor only hummed in response, pushing herself into a standing position and extending an arm towards Yaz. 

“Let’s get you some water, shall we?”

**Author's Note:**

> I listened to Rasputin an ungodly amount of times while writing this, so I hope you enjoyed it!!


End file.
